FLAGSTAFF, Ariz. (November 18, 2021) - The Lumberjack swimming team competed in three events, preliminary and finals, today at the A3 Performance Invite.
Last night, the invite hosted the 200 medley relay, as well as the 800 free relay in which both events the 'Jacks relay teams placed second. The morning session was preliminary events in the 500 free, 200 IM, and the 50 free.
Wednesday's night session second place finishes for the relay teams both came behind Colorado Mesa's 'A' team. The 200 medley relay kicked off the invite, with the Lumberjacks 'A' team, consisting of Sophie Velitchkov, Delaney Phillips, Caylah Jago, and Jane Shroufe. NAU finished in second place with a time of 1:43.70.
In the 800 free relay, NAU's 'B' team came in second place with a time of 7:33.82. The relay 'B' team was swam by Helena Robla-Alvarez, Casey Craffey, Francesca Criscione, and Katy Smith. The Lumberjacks 'A' relay squad came in third place with a time of 7:37.00, and was swam by Annie Carlton, Bena Koehn, Haley Mayhew, and Ashley Lawrence.
If Wednesday night wasn't enough, Thursday morning preliminary races proved for the 'Jacks just how competitive this invite is. Starting off the day in the 500 free, Craffey came in first place with a time of 4:56.83, just milliseconds off of the pool record. Robla-Alvarez followed her, coming in second with a time of 5:00.77.
"It was a good second day, I think we looked better each time we got in the pool. Obviously the 500 was the strongest events of the day, Casey had a great morning swim and Helena had a great night time swim but all of them that swam twice did a great job qualifying and then coming back and racing, and that's what were really here for is to get that experience of racing twice in a day," Head Coach Andy Johns said.
Jamie Dellwardt finished in the top five in the 200 IM prelims, at fourth with a time of 2:09.32. In a close 50 free prelims race, Freshman Lawrence and Koehn, had top five finishes with Lawrence in fourth at 24.47 and Koehn in fifth at 24.75.
The Lumberjacks started the finals session off strong, with three athletes placing in the top five. Robla-Alvarez brought the 'Jacks a first place victory in the 500 free with a time of 4:56.25, beating her prelims time by four seconds. Craffey came in just behind her, taking second with a time of 4:56.83. Francesca Criscione placed fifth with a time of 5:03.60.
Finishing today with the 200 free relay, the NAU 'A' relay team of Jago, Velitchkov, Shroufe, and Abbie Nelson, came in second place behind CMU with a time of 1:35.72.
"Tomorrow's going to be a great day, most of our team hasn't swam their best events yet, so we will just continue to get better and keep racing and keep gaining that experience that we're looking for," Johns said.
The Lumberjacks will be back in action tomorrow with preliminaries beginning at 10:00 a.m. MST and finals taking place at 5 p.m. MST. You can watch the events here. You can find live stats for the events here.
